


Beach Surprise

by goodgirlwhoshopeful



Series: Tell Me a Story I Haven't Written prompts [1]
Category: Poldark (TV 2015), Poldark - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Grief, angsty, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-18
Updated: 2016-01-18
Packaged: 2018-05-14 15:54:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5749108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodgirlwhoshopeful/pseuds/goodgirlwhoshopeful
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt from the wonderful @rainpuddle13 on tumblr as part of the 'Tell me a story I haven't written; prompt challenge. </p>
<p>Feel free to head to my tumblr (goodgirlwhoshopeful.tumblr.com) and leave me some – I'd be SO GRATEFUL because I love any excuse to write Romelza.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Beach Surprise

No one was more delighted to have sand between her toes than Demelza Poldark.

It had been barely one day since Ross’ release on bail… but it felt like ten years since  _that_  day that saw him taken to Truro gaol… Since  _Julia_.

As she walked, she let down her hair, sighing as her scalp wrung with relief. She knew she had been working herself too hard; not eating enough, if anything… but she could not sleep, much less  _eat_ , when the house had stood so bare and lifeless with only herself and Jinny moving within it. 

She knew that the dark rings beneath her eyes were stark enough to notice; Ross had feathered the pad of his thumb over them upon his return, his trademark frown furrowing his brow. In all… she  _knew_  she was a mess, but she simply could not find the fight to resolve it. After all, until one day previous, she had been a wife with no husband to care for, just as she was now a mother without a child… 

She feared, based on that fact, she would never truly see the beauty in the world again.

“ _Demelza_.” She turned to see Ross clambering to join her, leaving Darkie untied to chomp on the long grass. “There you are!”

She did smile then, for she had truly missed everything about him, but mostly the way his unruly curls moved in the wind. She was barefoot and deep in thought until he appeared, the heat of the early morning Cornish sun leaving her fare skin feeling pink already.

When he reached her, she could see in his eyes he wanted to embrace her; the look had been there since he came home. The sorrow in him made him  _crave_ , but she found she simply could  _not_  allow herself such pleasures, such  _indulgences_ , when her sweet Julia was so soon in the ground. 

He must have seen her sorrow, as he simply slipped his fingers into hers and began to walk, smiling as she deliberately skipped into the waves as they greeted the shore eagerly. 

“Oh, how I have missed you,” he said aloud in a whisper, his yearning clear in the gravel of his voice. She stopped in her tracks as her throat tightened suddenly, the reason for his going away – the trail, the shipwreck, losing Julia – and it was as though she was on that cliff edge alone all over again. 

“Oh,  _Ross_.” The words were a sob, despite her best efforts. “How will we ever rise again? How  _can_  we?” 

He pulled her wheezing form against his chest, the sounds she made quickly seemed to physically affected him as he found it hard to breath too. 

“Sometimes, I do wonder…” He raised his eyes to the early morning sky, contemplating life as the horizon seemed to get further and further away, as though symbolic of the impossible objective that he and Demelza must overcome.  “But we  _must_ , Demelza – for  _Julia’s_  sake.”

Demelza took the moment he gazed off at the sky to gaze at  _him_ , as had become a habit of hers, since t’was the only way she could truly see  _him_  without his guard. His tanned face was slightly sallow, accompanied by slightly purple shadow under his eyes, with his somewhat infamous ever-present beard slightly longer than usual… This is when she truly saw what he tried so desperately to hide; that he, too, was suffering. 

She rose on her toes and kissed his jaw ardently, in an attempt to silently communicate her solidarity without having to say it. He seemed surprised by the affection, since they had shared surprisingly little since his return, as he kissed her head and squeezed her waist in retaliation. 

Slowly, Demelza began walking again, setting the pace for the two as Ross lingered simply to watch her. He let her slip away from him as as weaved through the spray of the waves, but assured that he always held her, even if it were a connection as tenuous as remained by their little fingers. 

Suddenly, Demelza exclaimed ahead of him, breaking hold with his fingers to run up the beach, where a flock of gulls dove and squawked in chorus with one another. Ross’ heart was instantly triggered into a flurry at his wife’s distress, as he had come to expect since the worst since the calamities of the last few weeks. He broke into a run after her. 

“What, love?! What is it? –“  

“Oh, Ross,  _look_!” Demelza was suddenly in frenzied activity, and he quickly came to the conclusion as to why, as a dole of sea turtles were hatching from the dune, a sight so rare Ross had to stand and blink.

_“Leatherbacks!”_ he breathed in awe. “My father used to speak of sighting them nesting here in extremely warm summers, but I had never believed him because they usually only travel to our lands  _after_  they have nested abroad…  _My_.” He crouched down and watched as they broke from their shells, wriggling free through the white sand, and he grinned freely for the first time in, what felt like, decades.

“No!  _No!”_   He rose his eyes as her shrill, desperate cries shattered his reverie. Panic set in again as he stared at her as she ran in circles, flapping her arms. 

_“Demelza –“_

As he said her name, it was as though she had forgotten he was there.  _“Ross!_ The birds’ll get ‘em all!” As the dole of tiny amphibian bodies wormed their way over the tiny peaks and troughs of the sand toward the sea, the gulls dove to pick them up and carry them off. Even as young Demelza flapped, she could not protect every single tiny soul, as one or two of the birds managed to retrieve hatchlings in their beaks. 

_“No!”_  Demelza screeched as she threw up her arms, successfully making such a fuss that she almost struck a bird or two with her fists. “No! Don’t  _touch_  them! They’re just  _babes_!” Her voice was breathless and hoarse with panic. As he rose from his crouch, he stepped toward where the hatchlings wriggled, his arms held out to her. “Ross! _Help me!”_ She cried out, desperately, her wide eyes pleading with him. Her eyes welled with tears as she carried on with her desperate attempt to save every tiny life, her breathing escalating to a feverish rate with an audible wheeze. 

Her distress was clear. While she did indeed adorable animals, Ross knew her tears stemmed from a much deeper wound; from pain only the loss of a child could incur.

“Ross…  _Please_ …” she whimpered desperately over her shoulder as she frantically helped each hatchling into the water. The birds did not give in… and with each tiny loss, Demelza sobbed, seeing Julia, over and  _over_ again. 

Slowly, he sunk to his knees beside her, stilling her hands, which were now covered on wet sand. 

“No, Ross,  _no_ …  _Please_ … They’re  _bairns_  – “ 

His chest heaved as though pressed under God’s own boot at the despair in her voice. “I’m sorry, my love… I’m  _so sorry_.” She trembled as he wrapped her head in his arms under his chin. Tucking his nose into the mass of her flowing curls, Ross himself tried not to cry.  _“I love you,”_  he whispered against her head. “But we cannot save every life.” 

Demelza sniffed violently and rose her head to wipe her eyes. “I d’know that, Ross.” Her chin wobbled, but she did not succumb again. “Life has taught us both that.” 

Gently, Ross guided both her hands, now she was calm, to help the many hatchlings that remained into the sea. 

_“Shoo!_  Be gone with you!” he called to the gulls that flapped around his head, much to Demelza’s amusement and contentment.

“That’s it, li’le one,” she whispered encouragingly, lifting the stragglers that remained to the break of the surf. 

“ – Demelza, you  _really_  should not interfere,” he muttered, though his tone was teasing rather than scathing. Ignoring the wet of the salty waves, he knelt to watch them go. 

“There y’are,” she whispered, holding the last tiny hatching in the palm of her hand. “Now go;  _swim_  and  _grow_ and  _live_  a long and happy life.” Placing the tiny life into the salvation of the surf, Ross smiled as he marvelled at his wife’s ability to bounce back into optimism and blind belief in moments… Something he could really learn from her. 

Before she could get melancholy again, he slipped his arm around her and squeezed her tight. “I love you,” he whispered, despite the fact he had all but just said it, his words floating on the wind. She was as thrilled by his words now as she had been that first Christmas… but at least now she was brave enough to show him so. Gently she smoothing a hand over his beautiful face, sliding her fingers into his curls while her thumb smooth the length of his scar. 

“And I’m very lucky for it,” she whispered in reply with a kiss to where his scar almost met his eye. “I love you, from here to the moon and every star,  _and back_.” She was now thrilled by the way he flushed, despite the fact there was not a should around to hear them. “An’ I’m half certain I’ll still have  _mountains_  spare!”

“Likewise, my darling love.” Clearing his throat, Ross pressed a long kiss to her forehead…mostly so she would not see his glassy eyes. “ _Now_ ,” he began with a tone of renewed certainty. “Help me off with these boots, wife.”

At such a request, her light and airy giggles floated through the air as her jaw almost hit the sand. “You mean it?” Her eyes glittered with such childish excitement at the prospect that it filled his heart whole. 

“Yes! Why else would I ask?!” 

“Oh,  _Ross!”_  She grinned and span around in the waves with her gown in her hand, thrilled at the prospect he might finally join her in frolicking in the water. 

Watching his young wife’s childish temperament, he shook his head in mirth. 

“Well, come on, then! _On with it!”_


End file.
